Deciding To Be Legal: A Maya Community In Houston (Policy)

Deciding To Be Legal: A Maya Community In Houston (Policy)

To study the settlement process of undocumented migrants, this work examines one of Houston's Maya communities, the approximately 900 Maya from a township in the Department of Totonicapan, Guatemala. It traces this Maya community from its genesis in 1978 to the complex effects of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA).Review"This book makes an important contribution to the debate over immigration. It is theoretically sophisticated, particularly in its analysis of immigration and legalization as processes rather than definitive decisions, in its recognition that immigrants vary in the cultural and social capital that they bring, and in making clear that immigration means different things for men and for women. The empirical research is unusually rich since it is based on three years of intensive field work in which Hagan followed closely the decisions that her informants made with respect to staying or returning and taking advantage of the legalization provisions of the Immigration Reform and Control Act. The result is a fascinating account of how Maya Indians from Guatemala have adjusted to life in the post-industrial world of Houston. As one of the best urban ethnographies that I have read in a long time, it is essential reading not just for specialists in immigration but for anyone interested in how ethnicity is constructed in urban settings, in the formation of transnational communities, and in the study of the family as both resource and constraint among the urban poor."-Bryan R. Roberts, Population Research Center, University of Texas at Austin"Hagan's study is a welcome addition to the small but growing literature on the contemporary Maya diaspora."-About the AuthorJacqueline Maria Hagan is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Houston.